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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24413893">Close Call</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisiszircon/pseuds/thisiszircon'>thisiszircon</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>The Moment of Awakening [12]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Doctor Who, Doctor Who (1963)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/M, Post-Series</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-05-27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-05-27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 05:53:35</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>6,956</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24413893</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisiszircon/pseuds/thisiszircon</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>When answering a distress call, the Doctor and Ace find themselves on a suspiciously deserted space-station.  The peril they are in soon becomes apparent, but is that really what is frightening Ace?</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Seventh Doctor/Ace McShane</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>The Moment of Awakening [12]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/308457</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>20</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Close Call</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>With grateful thanks to my invaluable beta-reader and editor, <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/users/Nemo_the_Everbeing">Nemo the Everbeing</a></p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>Deep Space Research Station "Gell-Mann"</em><br/>
<em>Intergalactic space, approx. 2000 light years from Milky Way galaxy</em><br/>
<em>Earth Standard: 3207</em>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Ace stepped out of the transmat arch close on the heels of the Doctor.  She looked around.  Like all the levels of the space-station they'd so far explored, everything here was seriously high-tech.  This was another room of clean, smooth surfaces and panels, with little in the way of screens and keypads and levers.  They could be on the control deck; they could be in a research lab; hell, they could be in the kitchen, for all Ace knew.</p>
<p>"Ah!" the Doctor said, sounding pleased.  He made for one of the panels and began his usual combination of interested peering and hopeful prodding.</p>
<p>Probably not a kitchen, then.  Not unless he was gasping for a high-tech cup of tea.</p>
<p>Ace sighed to herself.  The room only confirmed what she had already learned: the whole station was clean and light and warm.  Doorways and transmat arches were in good working order.  Oxygen levels were healthy.  All systems seemed functional.</p>
<p>The odd thing was that, so far, they hadn't seen another living soul.</p>
<p>She'd been looking for clues, but in vain.  There was no evidence of panic or fighting: no discarded personal items, no bloodstains or signs of explosions, not even any abandoned half-eaten meals suggesting a swift getaway.  Just a neat, tidy space-station designed to support a human crew of around twenty, but without said crew.</p>
<p>"So where is everyone?" Ace asked.</p>
<p>"You tell me," the Doctor said.</p>
<p>She tutted irritably.  "How should I know?"</p>
<p>He stood up straight, distracted from his perusal of a sloped countertop.  "Good question.  And since I have seen the same things you have, why do you imagine I have an answer when you do not?"</p>
<p>Ace rolled her eyes.  "Because, oh ancient and wise guru of all things adventuresome, you <em>always </em>have more information than I do."</p>
<p>The Doctor turned away.  "Not in this instance."</p>
<p>"Seriously?"</p>
<p>"No, laughably," he griped.  "Of course seriously!"</p>
<p>"You're in a mood.  What's up?"</p>
<p>The Doctor pressed one bit of the countertop.  A holographic interface sprang up over it.  He swiped through the matrix of light and colour, humming at the options he found.  Ace squinted through the light to the surface below.  There was a tiny metallic symbol embedded in the counter.</p>
<p>"Professor?" she prompted.</p>
<p>"Something's wrong here," he muttered.</p>
<p>"Yeah.  That would explain the distress call.  And the lack of people."</p>
<p>"More than that."</p>
<p>He was all caught up in his interface, so Ace went to examine the other counters.  This tech was centuries out of her comfort-zone, but the station had been built by human beings and the TARDIS's Babel-fish presence down in the hydroponics hold meant that the language looked like English, even if it wasn't.  She cast her eye over the metallic script embedded in the smooth surface of one particular counter.  'Environmental.'  She pressed the symbol in the corner, and the console gave her a holographic interface.</p>
<p>"Do try not to blow up the space-station, Ace," the Doctor called.</p>
<p>"I've only got the central heating," she called back.  She blinked as a light spilled from the console and swept over her, then she carefully activated a few menus and got the hang of the interface.  "Yep.  Most dangerous thing I can do is make you want to take your jacket off."</p>
<p>"I think the heating is fine," the Doctor said distractedly.</p>
<p>She frowned at the interface.  "Just as well.  Controls are locked out.  Think they need a password or something."</p>
<p>"Ah.  Well, then.  It's system-wide."</p>
<p>"What is?"</p>
<p>"Quantum scan," the Doctor said.</p>
<p>She gave up on her console and went back over to join him.  "That TV show about the bloke jumping into other people's bodies?"</p>
<p>"What?  No.  The circuitry here undertakes a scan of its user.  Anything quantifiable: anatomical, chemical, thermal, electromagnetic, right the way down to the subatomic level.  All life-forms have a signature."</p>
<p>"True enough.  Worked hard on ours, me and Manisha.  On the off-chance we'd end up famous."  Ace smirked.  "Mine had a swirl and a smiley face."</p>
<p>He shot her an irritated glance.  "Not that kind of signature.  You're being frivolous, Ace, and while I would normally have no objection–"</p>
<p>"Something's very wrong," Ace supplied.  "Yeah.  What do you need?"</p>
<p>"I need," he said, his gestures over the interface growing ever more fractious, "to fool this console into believing that I have top-level privileges."  His words were growing forced, as if he fought a physical rather than an intellectual battle.  "Which is proving difficult," he growled, "because I am forcing a square peg into a round hole."</p>
<p>"Sounds nasty.  And the version without the peg-metaphor is...?"</p>
<p>"The interface has noticed that this body is not human."</p>
<p>Funny, that.  When Ace had been a witness to the Doctor in all his naked Time Lord glory, his body had looked pretty damn human to her.  Not that she was thinking about that.  She'd told herself weeks ago, just after they'd resolved things in Shanghai, that she was taking a holiday from all those wearying, pointless thoughts.</p>
<p>So she simply asked, "Want me to try?  Bog standard human being, present and correct."</p>
<p>"Gah!"  The Doctor lifted his hands away and stepped back.  He looked over at Ace, and his expression grew considering.  "Yes.  Well, you're wrong, of course."</p>
<p>"Usually am.  About what?"</p>
<p>"There is nothing about you that is remotely 'bog standard'.  But in this instance your humanity will serve."  He gestured for her to face the console, then the Doctor stood close behind her.  "Touch the green disc in the top left corner – good, now the topmost branch of the expanded tree, grab that – yes, just as though it's solid..."</p>
<p>His breath fluttered over the back of her neck.  Ace swallowed and reminded herself that she was <em>not</em> thinking about such things.  She concentrated on the interface.</p>
<p>"No," he said, "the left hand side.  Push it down, towards the activation control–"</p>
<p>"Which is?"</p>
<p>"The gold-coloured tray shape."  He tut-tutted.  "Isn't it obvious?"</p>
<p>"No.  And mind your manners."</p>
<p>There was a pause.  A beam of soft light swept out of the console and over her torso.  The Doctor peered past her, which made his body press against her back.  He steadied himself with a hand at her shoulder, unflustered by the physical contact.  Which was normal.  They were tactile with each other; always had been.  No reason to read into it.</p>
<p>"Good," he said.  "It recognises you're human."</p>
<p>"Excellent.  I'm a round peg."</p>
<p>"Quite so.  Now we just have to fool it into thinking you're the <em>right </em>round peg."</p>
<p>"And how do we do that?"</p>
<p>"May I?" he asked, and reached around her to take control of her arms.</p>
<p>A minute or so went by, with the Doctor moving her arms to certain bits of the interface.  Ace relaxed and let him do what was necessary: pull her strings to make her dance.</p>
<p>"Ha!"  The Doctor sounded victorious.  He stepped away.  Ace felt cold without his body against hers.</p>
<p>The console spoke.  This was disconcerting, because the voice sounded remarkably like that of Joanna Lumley.  "Welcome, Administrator Wong," it said.</p>
<p>Ace glanced over her shoulder.  The Doctor beamed at his own cleverness and gestured her to one side in a shoo-ing motion.  Ace rolled her eyes and stepped away.</p>
<p>"Typical," she muttered.  "Uses my body then casts me aside."  She frowned.  "Okay, that came out wrong."  A glance at the Doctor showed he wasn't interested; he was already swiping at new bits of the interface that had opened up for him.</p>
<p>"Voice interface is available," the console prompted.</p>
<p>"Yes," murmured the Doctor as he manipulated the matrix of light.  "I'll keep that switched off, thank you."</p>
<p>Around the room, interfaces sprang into life.</p>
<p>"Oh," the Doctor said, peering at his display.</p>
<p>"What?"</p>
<p>"That's odd."</p>
<p>"What?"</p>
<p>"The last instructions from Administrator Wong were designed to hide all preceding instructions."</p>
<p>"Up to no good?"</p>
<p>"One can only assume–...oh."</p>
<p>"<em>What</em>?"</p>
<p>"Oh dear."  The Doctor dashed across the room and began to manipulate another console.</p>
<p>Joanna Lumley's improbable voice announced, "Self-destruct is active.  Detonation in twenty-two minutes and thirty seconds – mark."</p>
<p>"Oh dear," Ace agreed.</p>
<p>The Doctor moved consoles again.</p>
<p>The voice said, "Containment of time distension at thirteen per cent."</p>
<p>The Doctor moved consoles yet again.</p>
<p>The voice said, "Departure of intergalactic shuttle 'Rutherford' on standard heading for Calithia Waystation at T plus two hours and thirty-seven minutes."</p>
<p>And from the original console, the voice added, "Self-destruct is active.  Detonation in twenty-two minutes – mark."</p>
<p>He spun around to look at Ace.  "We have to leave."</p>
<p>"Sounds like it," she agreed, already heading over to the transmat arch.  The Doctor grabbed her hand as he joined her.  He tapped a command into the arch's panel, then they stepped within.</p>
<p>Nothing happened.  No tingling, no brief disorientation, no swift and obvious change in location.</p>
<p>The Doctor went to push at the transmat panel again.  The light behind the panel, and around the structure of the arch itself, gave a flicker and powered down.  Behind them, one of the consoles exploded in a shower of sparks.  Without letting go of Ace's hand, the Doctor moved over to it.</p>
<p>The computer's voice said, "Containment of time distension at twelve per cen-per cen-per cen-per..."  The voice wound down, like a gramophone losing speed, then a sound came through the audio system that was like a million ice cubes cracking in a million glasses of water.</p>
<p>Ace winced.  "What the hell's going on?"</p>
<p>"I promise I'll tell you, if we survive the next twenty-two minutes," the Doctor replied.  "We have to get to the TARDIS."  He pulled her over to a low hatch beside the transmat arch, and when the small activator beside it failed to respond to his wave, he fell to his knees and began to pry at the covering.</p>
<p>"What's behind here?" Ace asked, getting a grip on her sense of practicality.</p>
<p>"Access tube," he said.  "Only way off this deck, without the transmat."</p>
<p>"How thick's the hatch?"</p>
<p>"Less than five mil."</p>
<p>"Hinged?"</p>
<p>"Left side, by the look of it."</p>
<p>"Shift."</p>
<p>The Doctor moved away from the hatch and allowed Ace access.  She tried the obvious thing and kicked the hatch hard with the heel of her boot.  It wasn't having it, so she grabbed one of her microcharges of Nine-A, crouched down and positioned it close to where the hatch was electronically bolted.  She activated the tiny explosive's five second fuse then scooted back.  The Doctor's arms caught her and dragged her behind the cover of the transmat arch, but he didn't need to; the directional charge did as it was supposed to do and blew open the hatch without making more of a shockwave across the control deck than a gust of breeze.</p>
<p>She grinned at the results.  "Ace," she whispered.</p>
<p>Beside her, the Doctor muttered, "Bog standard indeed," and scrambled past her to make for the access tube.</p>
<p>~~~</p>
<p>The computer system's voice said, "Self-destruct is active.  Detonation in nine minutes and thirty seconds – mark."</p>
<p>"Ace!" the Doctor shouted up at her.  "Don't come closer.  Back up.  Now."</p>
<p>"Why?" Ace asked, but she followed the instruction.  At least the zero-g in the access tube made it easy.</p>
<p>"The deck where we left the TARDIS is impassable."  He looked up – at least, it felt like 'up' – at her.  His expression was stony.  "Flooded with neutron radiation."</p>
<p>"What!  How come?"</p>
<p>Hand over hand, he returned up the tube to join her.  "Combine a nuclear reactor and an out-of-control quantum experiment."</p>
<p>The voice announced, "Self-destruct is active.  Detonation in nine minutes – mark."</p>
<p>Ace winced.  "So we can't get to the TARDIS?"</p>
<p>"<em>I </em>could.  But the exposure would kill you."</p>
<p>Ace swallowed.  Normally the nearby presence of the TARDIS meant that there was always a way out.  Remove that and you were just a frail human being trapped on a space-station counting down to a self-destruct.</p>
<p>"Go," she urged the Doctor.  "You can make it.  I'll go back to the control deck.  You can pick me up there."</p>
<p>"No time," he said gruffly, hauling himself up the tube past her.  "Next deck.  This way."</p>
<p>"Doctor – just, save yourself, okay?"</p>
<p>"I'm saving both of us," he called down.</p>
<p>She followed him to the next hatch.  The Doctor opened it and pushed himself out, and ended up falling sideways on to the floor.  He reached to yank her out after him.  Ace shook away the dizziness created by a sudden imposition of gravity.  They got to their feet.</p>
<p>"Where are we headed?" she asked, as he took her hand and pulled her to a T-junction with a passageway.</p>
<p>"Escape pods," he said.</p>
<p>"You can't stop the countdown?"</p>
<p>Helpfully, the Joanna Lumley-voice announced, "Self-destruct is active.  Detonation in eight minutes – mark."</p>
<p>"No," he said as they ran.  "Nor can I fix the so-called 'time distension' which is, in fact, a rift opening between our space and one of the nastier higher dimensions.  Nor can I stop whatever is using the rift as a conduit."</p>
<p>"Sounds serious."</p>
<p>"Deadly."</p>
<p>"As in...?"</p>
<p>"As in, the potential to cause the death of a galaxy.  For starters.  Which is why, even if I could, I definitely would <em>not</em> stop the countdown."</p>
<p>"What about the TARDIS?"</p>
<p>"Oh, the TARDIS will survive a little explosion.  We'll just have to come back for her."</p>
<p>Ace jogged alongside him.  The curve of the passage ran along the outer edge of the space-station; there were windows looking out onto the bright spiral disk of the distant Milky Way.</p>
<p>"So we're letting the space-station blow up?" she asked.</p>
<p>"The crew had the right idea.  When it's all gone horribly wrong, better to cut your losses."  He sighed.  "At least they had the sense to conduct these experiments far from the nearest star system."</p>
<p>"Why the distress call, then?  Did they forget to turn it off before they left?"</p>
<p>The Doctor shook his head.  "No.  You don't attract people to your location when it's about to blow up.  There are fail-safes."</p>
<p>"So...?"</p>
<p>"So something else is responsible for the distress call.  Something that has gained access to this station's computer systems.  Something that disabled the transmats and blocked the way to the TARDIS."  His breath was growing shorter.  "Which is why I'm concerned...that whatever's coming through the rift...is hoping to find a nice...portable...organic body...to use as a host."</p>
<p>Ace's eyes widened.  "This is an invasion?"</p>
<p>"Potentially.  If we don't get off this station in the next two minutes."</p>
<p>"The self-destruct won't go off for–"</p>
<p>The voice announced, "Self-destruct is active.  Detonation in seven minutes and thirty seconds – mark."</p>
<p>"There you go," Ace said.</p>
<p>"But the containment around the rift will collapse sooner."</p>
<p>"Oh."</p>
<p>"Ah!  Here we are!"  The Doctor exhaled hard with exertion and relief as he stopped alongside a bank of controls.  "Now then."  He activated an interface and began to swipe.  "Damn it!"</p>
<p>"Quantum scan?"</p>
<p>"Yes!"</p>
<p>"Then you need my body, don't you?"</p>
<p>The Doctor looked at her, startled, then he blinked the surprise away and pulled her in front of him.  Just like he had on the control deck, he used her body to fool the scanning beam.</p>
<p>The voice announced, "Self-destruct is active."  And then it told them seven minutes.</p>
<p>And then six minutes and thirty seconds.</p>
<p>"This is taking too long," Ace said.</p>
<p>"Nearly there – there!"  A hatch in the outer wall, almost the full height of the passageway, slid open, revealing access to an upright coffin-shaped pod.  There was a small window at 'head' height and cushioned sides.  It was probably big enough for an average-sized Ice Warrior.  Fortunately, that meant it was also big enough for an Ace and a Doctor.</p>
<p>"Come on," she said, pulling against his arms.</p>
<p>"I need to do another one!" he complained.</p>
<p>Somewhere below their feet came the ominous shriek of tearing metal and polymers and, quite possibly, of an extra-dimensional life-form intent on destruction.</p>
<p>"No time!" Ace reminded him.  "Also, I've no idea how to drive this bloody thing.  Come on!"</p>
<p>She dragged him over to the hatch and shoved him inside.  He squeezed up, leaving as much space as he could, and Ace stepped into the gap.  The pod accommodated their presence with almost a whole inch to spare between their bodies.  After a swift scan of the controls, the Doctor reached around her head and pressed some kind of activation unit in the wall of the pod.  The hatch door closed and locked in place.  There was a rumble and a judder, and Ace wished fervently that she hadn't used the description 'coffin-shaped' in her head.  Realising you were about to take on the wastes of intergalactic space with only a flimsy pod to separate you from the vacuum was an oppressive thought.</p>
<p>With a lurch that flipped Ace's stomach, the pod fell clear of its housing before its thrusters engaged.  Ace twisted her head to look out of the window.  All she could see was blackness, broken up by the odd parcel of gas reflecting the luminescence of the station.  The Doctor finished doing whatever he needed to do to the controls and settled back.  Unexpectedly, he put his arms around her in a loose embrace.</p>
<p>Sometimes the Doctor made it difficult to remember that she was taking a break from her inconvenient feelings.</p>
<p>"Professor?" she said quietly.</p>
<p>"Mmm?"</p>
<p>His thumb moved over her back.  If he'd been anyone else, she'd have considered the touch sensual.  Provocative, even.  But the Doctor didn't do that stuff.  Or...okay, so yes, he <em>did</em> do that stuff, she <em>knew</em> he did because it had been happening more and more.  But only by accident.  He didn't mean anything by it.  How could he?  All those recent occasions when she'd wondered whether he was trying to tell her–</p>
<p>Her thoughts stuttered.  They'd been doing that a lot, lately.  Each time she thought about her relationship with the Doctor, something weird happened in her head.  She went from frantic speculation to utter blankness, as if her brain had tripped over something.</p>
<p>"It's all right," she said, "I'm not scared."  Because she'd chosen to interpret his touch the safest way she could.</p>
<p>"Maybe I am," he said.</p>
<p>She gave in and hugged back, mainly because she'd been lying; she <em>was</em> scared.  "Will we be clear of the detonation?"</p>
<p>"Yes," he said, with only the briefest hesitation.  Enough to make Ace translate the word to 'probably'.</p>
<p>"And the creature in the rift?  Will it come after us?"</p>
<p>He swallowed.  "It might."</p>
<p>"And if it does?"</p>
<p>"We'll deal with that if it happens."</p>
<p>They were quiet for a while.  The pod described an arcing journey away from the space-station, rotating as it manoeuvred such that the station itself eventually came into view through the pod's porthole.  Ace gasped as she saw a strange haze that had formed a halo around the lower decks.</p>
<p>"That's the rift?"</p>
<p>"No," the Doctor replied, low and angry.  "The rift is invisible.  <em>That </em>is what happens when you play around with quantum mechanics you don't understand."</p>
<p>"What is it?"</p>
<p>"An infitalis."</p>
<p>"A whatie-what?"</p>
<p>"Infitalis.  It means 'outsider from the void'.  A being from dimensions normally inaccessible from our universe."</p>
<p>"That big purple cloud is a being?"</p>
<p>"More like its shadow.  The body exists in dimensions where physicality is different.  Now it's moving into this universe, it's casting a kind of shadow over normal space.  It's close.  But it will require a physical form to take control.  It already has a grip on the station's AI systems."  The Doctor's hand rubbed up and down her spine.  "It would have preferred you or me."</p>
<p>"Can it reach us out here?"</p>
<p>"Yes.  Given time."</p>
<p>The view from the window tilted as the pod moved, until the space-station moved out of sight once more.</p>
<p>"And when the station blows up?" Ace prompted, trying to sound confident about the prospect.</p>
<p>"The energy surge should send the creature fleeing for its own dimensions.  Then the rift will close."  His hand came up high, snuck under her ponytail and began to massage her neck.</p>
<p>Ace blinked at the intimacy, then decided to accept it.  No point spending the last few minutes of her life arguing.  "How long before the bang?"</p>
<p>"Two minutes and twenty-two seconds."</p>
<p>Ace nodded.  "Okay."  She hesitated.  "Right then.  I spy with my little eye–"</p>
<p>She stopped, because the Doctor's giggling was infectious and she had to giggle too.</p>
<p>When they'd settled down, Ace said, "Well, since we're trapped in this life-pod, light years from the nearest solar system, right slap-bang next to an explosion and a hungry, marauding Infant-Alice–"</p>
<p>"Infitalis."</p>
<p>"Yeah, that."</p>
<p>"Then...?"</p>
<p>"Then what?"</p>
<p>"Since we're here, with those things happening – you didn't finish the sentence."</p>
<p>"Oh!  Right."  She gave a sniff.  "Seems like a good time to ask you something."</p>
<p>For a moment she thought he wasn't going to respond.  Then she heard him murmur, "And what's that?"  His embrace tightened.</p>
<p>"Seriously.  How <em>did</em> you move that sofa into the console room on your own?"</p>
<p>The Doctor hesitated, then his arm moved to activate the controls that were embedded in a panel of the pod just behind Ace's head.  "Magic," he said.</p>
<p>"Bugger off.  Come on – it's been bugging me for weeks!"</p>
<p>"I employed the services of some Borrowers.  Or was it a House Elf?"</p>
<p>"You reconfigured the whole console room around it, didn't you?"</p>
<p>He laughed at that.  "Of course I didn't.  I used a small anti-grav field generator and floated the furniture down the corridor."</p>
<p>"Oh."  She frowned.  Her thoughts were getting sluggish.  "That's a bit ordinary.  I'm sorry I asked, now."</p>
<p>"Then I refer you back to 'magic'."</p>
<p>"'Kay."</p>
<p>She sensed him peering out of the porthole-thing again.</p>
<p>"How's our distance?" Ace mumbled.</p>
<p>"We seem to be rather close at the moment."</p>
<p>"From the station!" she corrected, and nudged him with an elbow.</p>
<p>"Oof.  We'll be fine."</p>
<p>"Are you just saying that so I won't be scared?"</p>
<p>"If we weren't fine, I'd have said we were, for that very reason."  His hand was rubbing the back of her neck again.  "But as it happens, we'll be fine."</p>
<p>"Good."  She closed her eyes.  "Why am I sleepy?"</p>
<p>She heard a sigh.  "Because the oxygen supply in this pod is designed to support a single human life for the time it takes a recovery vessel to arrive.  Which happens to be about three hours."</p>
<p>"We've been in here for five minutes!"</p>
<p>"Yes.  But I've lowered the oxygen content to make it last."</p>
<p>Ace frowned.  "Why?"</p>
<p>"Because there was an experiment in time distension running when we got here.  After an explosion, that will mean the presence of certain very dangerous particles."</p>
<p>"Um–"</p>
<p>"The point is, it will take four hours before we can safely navigate the debris from the explosion.  And we need to get close enough to find the TARDIS."</p>
<p>"Four hours with two people."  She grimaced into the Doctor's shoulder.  "And three hours of air."</p>
<p>"Once I've programmed a safe flight-path, I'll go into respiratory bypass."</p>
<p>"Okay."  She swallowed.  "Will that be enough?"</p>
<p>"We'll make it.  As long as you stop cracking jokes and wasting oxygen."</p>
<p>"Check."</p>
<p>They waited.  It was, as it happened, quite a lengthy eight seconds before the self-destruct triggered the detonation of the space-station.  They were far enough away that they didn't suffer damage, but sufficiently close to have the pod buffeted along on the shockwave.  Within seconds of the blast, the purple halo seemed to suck itself into the centre of the action and was gone.  Ace watched the light show and clung to the Doctor.  She'd known worse danger than this, but there was still a part of her that was afraid to die.</p>
<p>The plasma fires were instantly suffocated by the vacuum, and the flashes of stray charge soon burned out.  Where, seconds earlier, a sleek and sophisticated space-station had hung in the aching emptiness between galaxies, there now swirled a cloud of dust, shrapnel and gas.  Ace peered at the wreckage, hoping for a glimpse of a small, friendly-looking blue box.</p>
<p>The Doctor did something else to the controls, then he tried to settle comfortably.</p>
<p>"Will you remember to wake up, please?" Ace murmured.  The lowered oxygen content was making her fuzzy, and she was pretty sure that the caresses on her neck were designed to stimulate her need to sleep.  "Lonely without you."</p>
<p>"I'll see you in four hours," he promised.  "Go to sleep."</p>
<p>"'Kay."</p>
<p>The sound of the Doctor's breath grew silent.  His hand slipped woodenly from her back.</p>
<p>Ace blinked away the need to weep and then closed her eyes, nestled against the Doctor's shoulder, trying to breathe him in.</p>
<p>The pod rotated slowly in the vacuum.</p>
<p>~~~</p>
<p>In Ace's dream, Ange said, "Just thought I should get it over with.  No big deal."</p>
<p>Ace nodded.  At sixteen years of age, this sounded like the height of wisdom and maturity.  She wanted to ask what it had been like, but obviously she couldn't.  There were some gaps in your own experience that you didn't reveal, even to your mates.</p>
<p>Then she was pressed into the sacking on the cargo deck of Glitz's ship.  He was heavy, and it wasn't easy to breathe.  Not that she'd been expecting satin sheets and candlelight, of course.  She supposed it could have been worse.  Ace would have preferred that he wasn't drunk, though.  Mainly because of the smell: that hot stale-beer smell, right in her face.  It was making her head throb.  As if there was no air.</p>
<p>"Ange said to get it over with," she told Glitz, as his weight pinned her to the sacking and his breath was a corrosive cloud in her face and she waited for the stinging between her legs to ease, because it had to get better, didn't it?  That was the point of losing your virginity.</p>
<p>"Quiet," Glitz growled.</p>
<p>Ange said, "He's probably trying to think of someone else.  That's what I do."</p>
<p>It seemed a good idea.  Ace closed her eyes.  Who could she think of?  Johnny Chess?  She wanted to think of the Doctor, but that wouldn't work because it wouldn't be like this with him, and she hadn't even met him yet.  Anyway, what the fuck was wrong with her, that Glitz needed a fantasy?  Weren't hairy-arsed blokes supposed to go mad for a bit of succulent teenage flesh?</p>
<p>In between the pants and grunts, Glitz said, "I know why you're doing this."</p>
<p>Ace panicked and said, "Shut up."</p>
<p>Ange said, "Yeah, that.  Word of advice?  Just keep telling yourself it's because you thought you should get it over with.  Say it often enough and you convince yourself.  That's what I did."  She sighed.  "Wasn't true, of course.  I did it 'cause Chris said he'd dump me if I didn't."</p>
<p>Ace said, "Why are you even here–...ow!"</p>
<p>Glitz had dragged her left leg up and pressed it back against her body, as though he was trying to fold her in half.  The discomfort intensified.  "Shut up, prozzie," Glitz muttered, thrusting harder.</p>
<p>"I'm not a prostitute!"</p>
<p>"Course you are.  Get me all boggle-eyed, offer yourself on a plate?"</p>
<p>"Hey – you chatted <em>me </em>up!"</p>
<p>"Right.  Can't resist my masculine charms?  My arse.  You want something."</p>
<p>"You're supposed to be drunk.  Shouldn't you be slurring your words?" Ange pointed out.</p>
<p>"You want a job," Glitz went on, as if Ange wasn't even there.  "A place to stay.  Somewhere to belong.  You want a friend.  Figure your tight little slit is the only way you'll get it."</p>
<p>"Shut up!" Ace shouted.  Shouting was hard because there was no air.  She hated the tears in her eyes.  She hated feeling like a stupid kid.  She hated that Glitz was one hundred per cent correct.  "Shut it, you hairy, lardy tosser!"</p>
<p>Glitz opened his eyes and stopped thrusting.  He let her pinned leg fall back to rest.  The pain between Ace's legs eased.  "That's it, sprog," he said.  "I've lost the mood."</p>
<p>Ange said sagely, "Probably shouldn't have called him those names."</p>
<p>In the dream, Ace trembled with humiliation and self-loathing.  She balled her fists and beat Glitz around the face, although she couldn't get much of a swing going when they were shoehorned into this stupid padded coffin.</p>
<p>"Give over, sprog."  Glitz leered down at her, all beer-breath and disdain.  "Thought even you were too old for tantrums."</p>
<p>"Just fuck off, Glitz!" she cried.  "Wish I'd never let you touch me!"  She tried to sound angry.  Anger was more soothing than shame.</p>
<p>"Ace," Glitz said gently.  "Ace.  It's all right.  It's just a dream."  But his breath was in her face and she hated him almost as much as she hated herself.  She reached up to gouge at his eyes.  He flinched back and her clawing fingers managed only to scratch, but when he took her hand to stop her from repeating the assault, he was firm but kind.  "It's all right.  You need air.  Just hold on.  A few more minutes."</p>
<p>"Just wanted to get it over with," she despaired, still trying to lie, trying so hard.</p>
<p>The world was fading into darkness.</p>
<p>The gentle voice said, "I need to let go of your hand."</p>
<p>"Doctor?"  A new sense of panic.  Everything was black and airless and terrifying.</p>
<p>"Yes, I'm here."</p>
<p>"I'm sorry.  I'm sorry.  I wish I'd waited."</p>
<p>"Hush, now."</p>
<p>"Mr Right."  Her heart hammered so fast it was hard to tell one beat from the next.  "Oh, god, Doctor.  I'm so sorry."</p>
<p>"It's all right."</p>
<p>The panic was overwhelming because Ace was convinced she'd betrayed herself.  The Doctor had to know, now; he had to know everything.  He'd heard it or seen it or maybe stolen it from her mind.  Would he forgive her?  Would things ever be easy between them again?</p>
<p>"Thought I had no choice," she mumbled.  "I was all alone."</p>
<p>"I know.  It's all right."</p>
<p>She sank into the fuzzy darkness, wondering why the Doctor had shown up but Ange had buggered off.  She couldn't breathe.  Her lungs kept trying to fill but there was no relief.  Her chest was tight and hurt like fire.  The sound of her galloping heartbeat was getting more distant.</p>
<p>"Doctor," she whispered.</p>
<p>She slipped, deeper and deeper.  Ace's body fought for oxygen that was no longer available, but she barely noticed the struggle.  She wasn't asleep; it was emptier than that.  She wondered if she should be afraid.</p>
<p>Then she died.</p>
<p>...</p>
<p>A sharp pressure, and a short but agonising burst of pain in her chest.  Her body convulsed, then her back arched and her lungs dragged in air that was all around her, oxygen-rich, the taste of home.  The taste of the TARDIS.</p>
<p>Her eyes tried to blink open but the white light was too much.  She closed them again.  Over the sound of her own laboured breathing she heard another person panting, almost sobbing.  She reached out in that direction as her heart found a rhythm and her lungs filled and her chest ached.</p>
<p>"Ace."  It was the Doctor's voice.  "Ace."  His breath hitched between the words.  "Thought I'd lost you."</p>
<p>"'S'okay," she said.  Her throat made the words sound ragged.  "Still here."</p>
<p>"I need to get you to the medical bay."</p>
<p>"'Kay."</p>
<p>Her hand found the Doctor's and they lay there, listening to each other breathe.  Ace tried to review what had happened.  Space-station.  Escape pod.  Explosion.  She'd slept, and while she slept she'd had a dream: one she could barely remember except that she knew it had been bad.  She recalled an abject sense of shame.  With the dream, a buried part of herself had been unearthed.  An ugly thing.  A truth.  What was it?  Something she'd hidden away for a long time...</p>
<p>Oh god.</p>
<p>She'd sold her virginity for the chance to survive.  Dorothy McShane: teenage whore.</p>
<p>Glitz had come through for her, too.  He'd let her get him drunk, let her seduce him with clumsy flirtations, then he'd fucked her on the floor of the Nosferatu's cargo deck.  He hadn't been rough, nor had he been particularly gentle.  He'd mainly been fast, in truth; a couple of sweaty, grunting minutes and it was done.  Afterwards, he'd set her up with a fake ID and then taken her to the caff.  He'd got her a job.  When she'd tentatively suggested that this meant they were friends, he'd laughed and called her a sprog.  Just a nasty little reminder that he knew what she'd done, and why, and how it made her feel.</p>
<p>She opened her eyes again and waited for the blurring in her vision to clear.  This time the brightness settled into something familiar and welcoming: the console room.  When she was able to focus properly she saw that the heavy white doors to the TARDIS stood wide open, a debris-littered starscape visible beyond.  The escape-pod lay to one side, its hinged lid caught on the underside of the console.</p>
<p>The Doctor was slumped in front of the pod, watching her.  There was an angry scratch over his left cheekbone and the bridge of his nose.  The broken skin had smudged blood down his face.  Ace knew it was her fault, though she couldn't remember why.</p>
<p>She bit her lip.  "Sorry."</p>
<p>"It's all right."</p>
<p>"Is it?"</p>
<p>"We survived," he declared.  "We're home."</p>
<p>She closed her eyes again.  The act of looking, moving, even thinking seemed to require the most wearying effort.  "Did we save the universe?" she asked, because there were times when changing the subject was the wisest choice.</p>
<p>"Well – we managed not to <em>destroy </em>the universe," the Doctor replied.</p>
<p>She sighed.  Her chest hurt like a bastard.  "Bloody hate distress calls," she mumbled.</p>
<p>And then she passed out.</p>
<p>~~~</p>
<p>Ace came to feeling a whole lot better.  It took only a few blinks for the clean surfaces of the TARDIS medical bay to sharpen from a blurred wash into tangible lines.  She breathed experimentally and noted no ache in her chest.  Her airways no longer rasped with every inhalation.</p>
<p>"You're fine," the Doctor's voice said quietly.</p>
<p>She had to tilt her head back and twist her neck to look in the direction the voice had come from.  The Doctor was sitting on the floor against the roundeled wall, knees up to his chest and neatly surrounded by his arms.  He was in his shirtsleeves.  This made him look about as dishevelled as he ever got.</p>
<p>"Oh.  Good," she said.  It seemed the appropriate answer.</p>
<p>A pause.  Long enough for Ace to hear the Doctor exhale; long enough to hear the tremor in the sound.</p>
<p>"Professor," she began, feeling as though she needed to apologise.  "Um–"</p>
<p>"You suffered some trace damage from the radiation.  I've treated it."</p>
<p>Ace swallowed.  "Thanks."</p>
<p>"Your heart's been strong and steady for six hours now."</p>
<p>He'd been sitting there for six hours?  Probably not.  Probably he'd spent the time spring-cleaning the cloisters and solving pi to a zillion decimal places.  He'd just popped back ten minutes ago, expecting her to wake up.  That made more sense.</p>
<p>The Doctor said, "I was going to forbid any strenuous exercise for a few days, but I suspect it would be an unnecessary precaution."</p>
<p>"Okay.  Profess–"</p>
<p>"Your brain function is fine.  I've checked.  It took me longer than I'd have liked.  To get you back to the TARDIS, I mean–"</p>
<p>"Professor – shut up!  Are <em>you</em> all right?"</p>
<p>"Me?"  He glanced up, which only emphasised how he'd been talking to his clasped hands.  He looked surprised.  "I'm perfectly well.  Why wouldn't I be?"</p>
<p>"Um – because you came out of respiratory bypass in a pod that didn't have the oxygen to sustain a fruit fly?"</p>
<p>"I managed."</p>
<p>"Yeah, noticed that."  Ace's neck was starting to hurt, so she relaxed her twisted posture and stared up at the ceiling instead.  "You flew that thing straight into the console room, in spite of not being able to breathe.  How did you do that, anyway?"</p>
<p>"Manoeuvring thrusters are a simple issue of physics."</p>
<p>"That's not what I mean.  How did you even open the TARDIS door?"</p>
<p>"The usual way.  With my key."</p>
<p>"So you opened the pod."</p>
<p>"The small hatch, at one end."</p>
<p>"How did you do that without blowing us both out into space?"</p>
<p>"There's a force-shield to contain the air pressure.  It <em>was </em>the thirty-third century."</p>
<p>Ace tried to sit up.  Her head lifted a short way off the cushioned bench, but something caught and held her.  She slumped back and twisted to look at the Doctor accusingly.</p>
<p>"Do you have me tied up?" Ace demanded.</p>
<p>Surprisingly, the Doctor gave a small smile.  "Sometimes it's the safest way."</p>
<p>"Yeah, I'm sorry I hurt you, okay?  Oxygen deprivation!"  She glared at the blood-smeared scratch on his face.  "And by the way, you might have used some of your special salve on that – you've had six bloody hours!  That would have been the polite thing to do.  Or are you being pointed?"</p>
<p>His smile faded into a look of helplessness as his hand lifted part-way to his face then dropped back.  "I forgot it was there."</p>
<p>Ace captured her bottom lip and bit at it.  Under the surface of this catch-up conversation there was something happening that she didn't understand.  Something honest and scary and potentially hurtful.</p>
<p>"Would you please untie me?" she asked.  Even to her own ears, her voice sounded harsh.</p>
<p>The Doctor nodded and stood up.  He grimaced as he did so, as if he really had been sitting there, watching her recover, for hours on end.  He approached the bench and began to disconnect the sensors he'd placed around her head.  His fingers were cool and familiar in her hair.</p>
<p>"Thank you for re-starting my heart," she said, making an effort to be more calm and measured.  It seemed the least she could offer after the most literal bit of life-saving he'd ever done for her.</p>
<p>"I should have brought you straight here," the Doctor muttered, out of her line of vision.  "Would have been easier.  Safer."</p>
<p>"You had oxygen deprivation too," Ace pointed out.</p>
<p>"I panicked," he confessed.  His breathing was still shaky.  Ace wasn't sure she'd ever witnessed him so emotional.</p>
<p>Well, maybe once.  Just before they'd left Colonis.</p>
<p>She heard him give a sniff, and his hands moved away.  She sat up and turned to let her feet dangle over the side of the bench.  She didn't even feel dizzy or achy: thank you, TARDIS medical technology.</p>
<p>"We made it," she said.  The words sounded familiar.  Hadn't he said the same thing, more or less?</p>
<p>The Doctor nodded.  He wouldn't look at her.  "You're fine," he said again.  It was as though he was telling it to himself.  Then, with a suddenness that was startling, his shoulders went back and his expression changed to one of brisk impatience.  "Anyway, I've a lot to do.  Any chest pains, come straight back here.  The ship will tell me.  See you later."</p>
<p>He spun and headed for the door.  Ace couldn't find the will to stop him.  Everything else besides, she knew him well enough to recognise when he needed some space.</p>
<p>She looked down at herself and absent-mindedly peeled off the heart monitor he'd placed above her breasts.  She set it aside, and reached to switch off the medical computer that was now complaining that its signal had been interrupted.</p>
<p>Then she did a double take and looked down at the white cotton robe she wore.  Her modesty was preserved by nothing else.</p>
<p>"You undressed me," she said to herself.  She rolled her eyes.  "He undressed me," she said to the TARDIS.  "Does he do that to all his companions?"</p>
<p>She stood up, gathering the robe around herself as well as she could, feeling exposed and vulnerable.  Then she shivered as the shadow of a memory fell over her.  She recalled how, as a scared and lost sixteen year old, she had made a decision that relinquished any right she had to a sense of modesty.  Girls who made choices like that didn't get to feel chaste.  She was pretty sure those were the rules.</p>
<p>"Okay, so maybe he just does it to the ex-teenage-prostitutes," she murmured to herself.</p>
<p>The bile of self-disgust rose in her throat.</p>
<p>~~~</p>
<p>Several hours later, Ace had showered twice and was clothed in tracksuit bottoms, a sweatshirt and thick socks.  She didn't like the way her face and hands remained naked and exposed to the air, but she was also aware that putting on gloves and a balaclava while in the sheltered interior of the TARDIS would prove that she was currently about as fucked up as a fucked up thing can get.</p>
<p>A knock came at the door to her quarters.  Ace hesitated, thinking about what she could even say, before she called admittance.  The Doctor poked his head around the door but didn't breach the threshold.  He'd cleaned up the scratch on his face.</p>
<p>"How are you feeling?" he asked.</p>
<p>"I'm fine."</p>
<p>"Hungry?"</p>
<p>Actually she was starving.  Still, she said, "No thanks."</p>
<p>"Tea?"</p>
<p>"I'm more tired, than anything else," she lied, and turned away to fiddle with something on her dresser.</p>
<p>He didn't reply for a few seconds: long enough to make her turn around and check he was still standing there.  When he had her attention, he nodded stiffly.</p>
<p>"I'll let you sleep, then," he said.  "Goodnight."</p>
<p>"Night."</p>
<p>He closed the door, leaving her alone with her thoughts.  Ace sighed and looked around at the familiar room.  All was as it should be, and yet nothing seemed to look right, feel right, fit right; not anymore.</p>
<p>Maybe another shower might finally make her feel clean.</p>
<p>~~~~~~</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Some thoughts on the Glitz thing.</p>
<p>It is semi-canonical that Ace loses her virginity to Sabalom Glitz.  Paul Cornell references the event in his New Adventures novel 'Happy Endings', apparently drawing from character notes Ian Briggs produced when he originally created Ace.</p>
<p>I have yet to meet an Ace-fan who likes the idea.  It certainly makes my skin crawl.  A man of almost fifty (assuming Glitz's age to be similar to that of actor Tony Selby in 'Dragonfire') having sex with a sixteen year old girl might not be breaking the law, as codified in the UK at time of writing, but it is still dodgy.  Considering that the male participant is in a position of power over the girl amplifies the issue.</p>
<p>That said?  Ace's choice sadly makes sense.  Between her trauma-strewn childhood and that life-changing time storm, her options on Iceworld were limited.  It is plausible that she would never ask the authorities for help.  It is plausible that she would feel she has no marketable skills.  Glitz, of course, is established as an amoral bastard.  He's never going to grapple with ideas like fully informed and freely given consent.</p>
<p>Therefore I decided to accept this as part of Ace's back-story.  The incident is creepy, borderline abusive and reeks of patriarchal privilege along with female objectification, but it's still plausible.</p>
<p>In 'Happy Endings', Cornell has Ace refer to the loss of her virginity in a casual, dismissive way.  I've no idea whether he intended to imply that Ace has deeper, complex feelings on the issue that she wants to keep hidden, or whether he genuinely believed she'd have this indifferent attitude.  He never clarifies: the comment about Ace wanting to "get it over with" is very much a throwaway line.</p>
<p>I've been a teenage girl, though.  The loss of one's virginity is never, ever a throwaway line.  And it need hardly be pointed out that Sabalom Glitz is not a catch.  Not even if you squint.</p>
<p>Hence, my own interpretation.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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